Monster High Diaries: Draculaura and the New Stepmomster Read online

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  You are totes not going to believe this…my dad is getting married! Another vampire caught his eye at the Ice Ball in Antarctica last year. He saw her across the room, asked her to dance, and was sucked in. Just like that! Isn’t it the scary-cutest story ever?

  I don’t think there is anything sweeter than love at first bite.

  Dad’s trying to play it cool. (You know Father. Always so serious!) But from what he’s told me, Ramoanah (that’s her name!) is just amazing and he’s totes into her. After that night at the ball, they spent the next few months chilling out in Antarctica, and now

  THEY ARE GETTING MARRIED!

  I weddings!

  But here’s my tiny, little, itsy-bitsy secret. (Just a teensy thing. No big deal, I’m sure.) I’m kinda freaking out. I don’t actually know much about Ramoanah. Since she and Dad have been away in Antarctica and I’ve been here—attending Monster High—I haven’t even met her. And she’s going to be my stepmomster in less than a week!

  I’m sure she’s going to be fangtastic, just like Dad says she is. How could she not be? Still, I’m a little nervous, you know? What if she…

  Ugh! I can’t even write it!

  What if she…doesn’t like me?

  I know, I know. That would be silly. We’ll probably be beast friends, right? We’ll share style tips and watch boo-vies together. Maybe it will be so fangtastic having her around that it will be hard to even remember that it’s been just Dad and me for the past 1,600 years.

  I can’t wait for the wedding—it’s going to be so glamorous and elegant! And I’m so excited for my ghoulfriends to see what a real Transylvanian vampire wedding is like. They will all get to learn more about my vampire scaritage. The ghouls can meet my family and a ton of old vamp friends. Here’s the best part: We all get to stay at the Chateau Transylvania (it’s the fanciest hotel EVER—even Cleo will be impressed!).

  Oh, and I have a feeling that I might get to be Ramoanah’s maid of horror!! Or at least a batsmaid (that would be totally ghoul too). I’m hoping she will ask me as soon as we meet.…I want to be prepared, so I’m going to buy the most fangtastic hot pink and black dress ever created. I was so thrilled when Dad told me that Ramoanah had chosen black and pink as the colors for the wedding—looks like she and I have the same fave colors! I can’t wait to help her with all the final wedding plans when we get to Transylvania tomorrow!

  Gotta go! More soon.

  Smooches,

  Draculaura

  What do you think, ghouls?” A sweet and cheerful vampire named Draculaura stepped out of the changeling room at Neiman Monstrous, her favorite store in the Maul. She spun in circles. A shimmering, lacy black dress with beautiful hot pink details swirled around her legs. The dress matched her black-and-pink-streaked hair perfectly and made her pale pink skin glow. “Is this the one?”

  “Gore-geous,” Clawdeen Wolf proclaimed as she stopped pawing through racks of dresses to check out her ghoulfriend. Clawdeen was a fierce and stylish werewolf with a nose for fashion. “It’s perfect.”

  Frankie Stein’s one green and one blue eye went wide. “That pink makes you look totally voltageous, Draculaura.” Frankie, the only daughter of Frankenstein, also had a scary-cute style all her own, though she loved just about anything with black-and-white stripes.

  “I think we have a winner.” Draculaura giggled. Then she slipped behind the curtain to change back into her school clothes. “Don’t you just love weddings?” she called as she carefully pulled off the dress. “I can’t believe my dad is the one getting married!”

  “You haven’t been to a wedding until you’ve been to a royal wedding,” Cleo de Nile announced. Cleo—a mummy and Egyptian princess who was as loyal of a friend as she was a pampered diva—was sprawled out on a sofa nearby, impatiently waiting for the glass of fresh-squeezed orange juice she had insisted the shop clerk bring her to sip on while she waited for her friend to choose a dress for Dracula’s wedding. “Oh, but I’m sure your dad’s wedding will be really great too.…”

  “It’s going to be totally amazing, Draculaura!” Clawdeen agreed excitedly. “I’m stoked that us ghouls all get to come along. I never thought a werewolf like me would be taking two trips to Transylvania so close together.”

  Draculaura stepped out of the changeling room. “I’m excited too, ghouls. I feel so lucky that I get to have my beast ghoulfriends there with me. I just wish everyone at Monster High could come!” She sighed. “Because of course, the one little thing that would make this weekend extra fangulous would be having Clawd along. I’m going to miss my sweetie so much. Going to Dad’s wedding without him totally bites.”

  “No way,” Clawdeen replied quickly, shaking one sharp fingernail at her beast friend. The last thing she wanted was one of her siblings tagging along on the trip of this lifetime. Her pack stuck together too much as it was—sometimes, she just wanted to be with her beasties. “This weekend it’s just us ghouls. And it’s going to be clawesome!”

  Their zombie friend, Ghoulia Yelps, grunted her agreement. Ghoulia blinked behind her horn-rimmed glasses and readjusted the headband in her long, thick blue hair. She tucked the book she had been reading into her purse for later.

  Cleo rolled her eyes playfully and yawned. “If we ever leave the Maul, that is. Are you almost done, Draculaura? I think I aged another year while we waited for you to pick something.”

  “Ready!” Draculaura said cheerfully. She knew Cleo was only teasing—after all, Cleo was a stylish mummy who enjoyed shopping as much as any other ghoul!

  The Neiman Monstrous clerk—a slow-moving zombie—grunted as she lurched toward the counter to ring up Draculaura’s purchase.

  “I love that it’s just going to be us ghouls too but…I don’t get why Clawd can’t come along,” Frankie said.

  Draculaura frowned as she replayed in her head the conversation she’d had with her dad. Her father had been acting sort of weird in the days leading up to the wedding. Ever since he’d called to tell Draculaura about his fiancée, he had been acting even more serious than usual. Draculaura was pretty sure it was just prewedding jitters. But she was still a little hurt about what he had said when she asked for permission to invite Clawd. She told her friends, “My dad thought Ramoanah’s family might have a hard time swallowing the fact that I’m dating a non-vampire. Vampires, werewolves…you know. We’re not exactly known for getting along.”

  “Well, we’ll just have to help change their minds about that!” said Clawdeen.

  “I’m sure everything will be fine,” Draculaura said quickly. She hoped Clawdeen was right…but deep down she worried that it might not be so easy. “My dad is always super welcoming to other monsters. I’m sure Ramoanah will be too. Her relatives are probably just a little more conservative than Dad and I are. As you ghouls know, some vampires can have a teensy, eensy problem with anyone who isn’t a vampire…so I think Dad just wants to play it safe.”

  “Some old, stuffy vampires like Lord Stoker,” sniffed Clawdeen, thinking about her last trip to Transylvania with Draculaura. Lord Stoker had tried to make Draculau
ra believe she was the long-lost vampire queen. Luckily, Draculaura and her ghoulfriends figured out that Lord Stoker was tricking her, along with the rest of the vampires, so he could continue to control the vampire court. Draculaura and the Monster High crew had managed to find the real vampire queen—Draculaura’s old friend Elissabat—and made Lord Stoker look like a fool.

  “Exactly.” Draculaura giggled. “There are still a lot of vampires like Lord Stoker in Transylvania. The kind who think vampires should be the most respected and feared monsters in the world.” She rolled her eyes at the silliness of it all.

  “Ugh,” groaned Cleo. “That is so last century. Besides, it’s obvious that if any monsters were to be the most respected in the world, it would be the de Niles.” Cleo smiled at her beast friend and asked, “Isn’t that right, Ghoulia?”

  Ghoulia patted Cleo’s arm and smiled. Sometimes, it was easiest just to agree with Cleo. Ghoulia knew her beast friend had pretty strong opinions and really loved when people agreed with her.

  As they strolled out of Neiman Monstrous, Frankie said, “I bet the food is going to be totally electric!” She grinned as she imagined the fancy new foods she would get to try. “And speaking of food…Ramoanah’s family knows you’re a vegetarian, though, right, Draculaura?”

  Draculaura cringed. Unlike every other vampire she had ever met, she didn’t drink blood—she preferred fruits and veggies and lots of protein supplements. Just the thought of blood made her queasy, and she had been known to faint at the mere mention of the word!

  Draculaura and her dad had discussed her vegetarianism a lot over the years—it was hard for her dad to understand how Draculaura could be so different from other vamps. But deep down, she knew Dracula respected her choice. “I don’t know if they know…” she said, her voice trailing off uncertainly. “I mean, I’m sure my dad must have told Ramoanah, but I don’t know if she told her family or not. I hardly know anything about Ramoanah, actually. The only thing I know for sure is that my dad is batty about her and that she’s going to be a part of my family. I’m going to have to spend a lot of time getting to know her before the wedding!” She tried to smile, but her deepest worries about having a new stepmomster were rearing their ugly heads in her mind, and that made it almost impossible to pull off a real smile.

  Her ghoulfriends could all sense something was wrong. Ghoulia asked Draculaura what was eating her.

  “It’s nothing,” squeaked Draculaura.

  “Come on,” prodded Frankie. “You can tell us. We’re your beast friends.”

  Draculaura clutched the dress bag in her arms. She knew that telling her ghoulfriends what she was worried about would probably make her feel much better. “It’s just that…even if Ramoanah’s great—which I’m sure she will be!—I’m sort of nervous about everything changing.”

  “I get it,” said Clawdeen. “It’s been just you and your dad together for the past sixteen hundred years. It’s definitely going to be different having a stepmomster around.”

  “But it’s going to be great,” added Frankie.

  “You think?” asked Draculaura. “I just don’t know how we’re going to fit someone new into our family after all this time. And what if my dad likes her more than he likes me? Or what if Ramoanah doesn’t like me? What if things change, and…”

  “Things will change. That’s unlife,” Cleo said firmly. “But the other stuff you’re worrying about is totally ridiculous,” she added in a softer voice. She placed a hand on Draculaura’s shoulder to comfort her. “Your dad loves you. That’s never going to change.”

  The other girls nodded. Ghoulia said, “Everyone adores you, Draculaura. You’re such a true ghoulfriend.”*

  “Ghoulia’s right,” said Clawdeen. “Everyone loves you. And your dad has room for both of you in his life. Ramoanah is going to adore you too.”

  Frankie hugged her friend. “No one could ever take your place in your dad’s heart.”

  “Thanks, ghouls,” Draculaura said with a smile. “You’re the beast.” After talking through her concerns with her ghoulfriends, she certainly felt much better. They were right. She was probably worrying for no reason.

  They had a fangtastic wedding weekend to look forward to. She wasn’t going to waste a moment of it worrying. She grinned and linked arms with her ghoulfriends. “We leave tomorrow, so you know what that means—just a few hours to find the perfect wedding shoes!”

  And just like that, all of Draculaura’s worries about meeting Ramoanah floated away as she and her ghouls hunted for the most perfectly fangtastic shoes in the Maul.

  I LOVE Monster High to the max, BUT there is something so exciting about visiting Transylvania. I just love getting to reconnect with my vampire scaritage. It brings back so many fangulous memories of growing up in the vampire court. Sometimes it feels like forever ago that Dad and I fled Transylvania for the Boo World.

  Just between you and me, it was hard for me to leave Transylvania. I missed my friends, the pretty mountains, and all that lovely purplish night sky. It sure did help that Dad had our whole house rebuilt in the Boo World. So even though unlife is super different now than it was when we lived in Transylvania, the Boo World feels like home.

  And of course, I’ve met so many creeperific monsters at Monster High that I can’t even imagine going back to the old life. I would never have met Frankie, and Clawdeen, and Cleo, and Ghoulia, and Lagoona, and CLAWD, and…well, you get my point.

  Sometimes I forget that Frankie hasn’t seen much of the world yet. She was totes adorable when we boarded the train for Transylvania today. She got so electrified about the trip that she began to spark, and all the lights in the train went out! That poor ghoul…she just can’t help but get excited about new adventures.

  And speaking of being excited, my sweet little pet bat, Count Fabulous, is going batty too! He loves the Boo World, but I can tell he is happy we are going back to Transylvania!

  Well, gotta fly! More later.

  Smooches,

  Draculaura

  This way please, ladies.” A tall vampire in a three-piece suit greeted Draculaura and her friends at the train station. “I am Fangsly, one of the Chateau’s senior butlers. I have been tasked with your care for the weekend. We have a carriage waiting for you over here that will take you to the Chateau.”

  “Ooh, a butler!” Clawdeen said, wiggling her eyebrows. “For us?”

  “Now, that’s more like it,” Cleo said. “My luggage is over there, Fangsly. I expect it will be delivered to my room at the Chateau first thing.”

  “As you wish, miss,” Fangsly said, bowing. “Miss Draculaura, welcome home. Your father has asked me to deliver you to the hotel immediately so that you will all have time to freshen up in your suite before the bride’s family gala this evening.”

  “Gala?” asked Frankie.

  “Yes, miss,” confirmed the butler. “Tonight the bride’s family is hosting a welcome dinner for the esteemed guests of Dracula and Lady Ramoanah. A prewedding welcome party, so to speak. Dinner, dancing, and a reception.”

  “This is all so fancy!” Draculaura said, climbing into an elegant carriage. Heavy velvet curtains were draped over the windows. She pushed them open so her friends could get a better view of her homeland as they drove up the mountain to the Chateau. “Do you think Ramoanah’s family did all of this to welcome us home to Transylvania? I feel like royalty!”

  Cleo took a deep breath and settled into the plush cushions inside the carriage. “Draculaura—I must say, I’m impressed with Transylvania’s hospitality. They sure know how to make a princess feel at home here.”

  When they arrived at the hotel, a small crowd was gathered just outside the big oak front doors. “What is that about?”* groaned Ghoulia.

  “I don’t know what’s happening,” Draculaura answered, peeking out from behind the curtains. Fangsly whisked open the door of the carriage for them and began unloading their luggage. The ghouls hopped out and made their way toward the growing crowd.r />
  “What’s going on?” Frankie asked someone near the back.

  “Look, it’s Elissabat!” a cheerful young vampire squealed. “Our queen!”

  The young vampire’s friend added, “Also known as the greatest boo-vie star of all time—Veronica von Vamp! She’s signing autographs.”

  “Ooh!” exclaimed Draculaura, standing on tiptoes to try to see over the crowd. “Elissabat is here? I didn’t know she was going to be here for the wedding!” She waved her arms in the air. “Elissabat—over here!”

  The crowd that had gathered near the Chateau’s grand entrance all turned and stared. Someone nearby whispered, “Isn’t that Draculaura…? She’s the vampire who found Elissabat and persuaded her to come home to lead us as our queen!”

  “Draculaura!” Elissabat said, rushing over to greet her old friend. “It’s so fangulous to see you again. I was very happy to receive an invitation to your father’s wedding. It has been years since I last saw him!”

  Draculaura gave her vampire pal a hug, then stepped back so her ghoulfriends could greet Elissabat as well.

  Suddenly, a camera crew swooped in and surrounded the group. Cleo smiled radiantly and put her hand on her hip. “Make sure you get my good side!” She began posing, then nudged Draculaura and whispered, “I realize the cameras are probably here with Elissabat…but there’s no harm in letting them know that another royal is here too!”

  Draculaura couldn’t help but giggle at Cleo’s antics, even as she squinted in the bright camera lights.

  Elissabat snapped her fingers and waved the cameras away. “That’s a wrap for now. Please give us some time to say hello before you start filming!”

  “Don’t be silly,” Cleo said, still posing. “I’m happy to let them film me at any time. I know how much people love to see footage of royalty, and I love to give the people what they want.” The crew packed up their cameras and walked away. Cleo called after them, “I’ll be here all weekend. You’re free to point those cameras in my direction at any time!”